


Maybe We Can Do A Country Album After All

by isnt_that_wizard



Series: We'll Always Be More Than A Band (JATP) [7]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: ??? - Freeform, Alex is a good friend, Alex is done with their crap, Angst with a Happy Ending, Country Music, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Idiots in Love, It's happy though, Love Confessions, M/M, Misunderstandings, Reggie and Luke for the win, Reggie is nervous, Reggie loves country y'all, Singing to each other, Song Lyrics, There's also some crying, angst happened???, but it's brief, luke is oblivious, the boys have no braincells, this was supposed to be pure fluff and then, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:42:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26919043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isnt_that_wizard/pseuds/isnt_that_wizard
Summary: “That’s really good,” Alex whispered to Reggie after a minute or so of listening. “Is Luke writing a new song?”Reggie was biting back a smile as he shook his head.“No,” he whispered back. “That’s my song. I came down here and heard Luke playing it! I put it in his journal but I figured- He actually read it!”----------Reggie was constantly writing little bits of lyrics and sticking them in Luke's journal for the other to find. When he puts a full length song in there, he's surprised and happy to find Luke singing it. When they talk about the song, however, Reggie realizes it'll bring up two things: the fact that this was the most personal thing Reggie had ever written, and- more importantly- the question of who exactly Reggie wrote the song for.
Relationships: Alex & Luke Patterson & Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms), Alex & Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms), Luke Patterson/Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms)
Series: We'll Always Be More Than A Band (JATP) [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1956307
Comments: 35
Kudos: 563





	Maybe We Can Do A Country Album After All

**Author's Note:**

> The lyrics from this fic are taken directly from the song "More Than You'll Ever Know" by Travis Tritt

As cool as Luke and Reggie insisted their weird teleportation skills were, Alex spent most of his time walking places like he had done while alive. It was just something that made him feel better about all the changes since becoming ghosts. It’s what he was doing now; he was walking back to the studio after a date with Willie. He whistled a little as he walked, completely minding his own business and thinking about his skater boyfriend. 

When he reached the garage, though, he stopped in his tracks. He tilted his head to the side and narrowed his eyes, watching Reggie in question. Reggie, who was bouncing on the balls of his feet and smiling wider than Alex had seen in a long time. He kept glancing at the garage, then bouncing around ever so slightly. Alex wouldn’t be surprised if he suddenly broke out dancing. The bassist was fiddling with the sleeves of the flannel wrapped around his waist, though not in the nervous, timid way Alex was used to seeing from him. It was like the ghost was practically glowing; he looked so excited and happy. Alex approached him slowly, a small smile forming on his own face. When Reggie was happy like this, it was infectious- completely impossible to resist the spread of his joy. 

“What are you smiling about?” Alex asked, a teasing but curious tone in his voice. He  _ loved _ seeing Reggie like this, but it didn’t happen very often.

Reggie turned that blinding smile on him, making Alex laugh a little. Reggie bounded over to him, tugging on Alex’s sleeve and pulling him towards the doors of the garage. He stopped them just outside of the barely open door, causing Alex to raise an eyebrow at his best friend. 

“Reg, what are we-”

“Shh!” the bassist interrupted him while holding up a finger to his own lips. “Just listen.”

Alex shut his mouth, shaking his head with a smile at whatever had Reggie like this. As they both quieted, Alex heard it. The sound of Luke’s guitar and singing were floating through the air, just able to be heard from where they were standing. Luke’s voice had an unusual but nice sounding raspy-ness to it as he sang, low and at a quiet volume that Alex knew meant Luke was still learning how to sing it. The notes coming out of his guitar had a twang to it, also unusual. It was almost captivating to listen to Luke playing the piece. It was slower than their usual rock or pop. The ever unusual ballad. It was beautiful.

“That’s really good,” Alex whispered to Reggie after a minute or so of listening. “Is Luke writing a new song?”

Reggie was biting back a smile as he shook his head. 

“No,” he whispered back. “That’s  _ my  _ song. I came down here and heard Luke playing it! I put it in his journal but I figured- He actually read it!”

At that, Alex went quiet again, listening carefully to the lyrics Luke was singing. He could hear them now. 

_ “ _ _ More than life, more than I've ever loved before _

_ It's absurd and beyond words, I couldn't want you more _

_ And when I try to pour my heart out to you I'm not sure it shows _

_ That I love you more than you'll ever know” _

He had been right about it being a ballad, but it was a  _ country  _ ballad. He could place the raspy-ness and twang now. He knew how much Reggie loved country, and he was constantly writing short poems of lyrics, sticking them in Luke’s journal to joke with their lead guitarist. He didn’t know that Reggie ever wrote whole songs, though. The ballad Luke was singing right now was amazing. Now that he was listening to the actual lyrics, Alex can hear that they weren't Luke’s usual style. It did sound like Reggie. And, as failed as his romantic endeavors had been in the past, Reggie was definitely the romantic among them, and the song’s lyrics were proving that. He didn’t think too much about who exactly the lyrics were about; he knew Reggie far too well to not know instantly. He had caught onto the spared glances and lingering touches years ago.

“You  _ wrote  _ that?” Alex turned to him. “Holy crap, Reg!”

Reggie’s smile seemed to get impossibly wider at Alex’s approval of his song. He was bouncing up and down excitedly again, and Alex couldn’t resist the urge to wrap his best friend in a hug. He could feel Reggie smiling into his shoulder as the bassist squeezed his arms around Alex’s torso happily. 

“I can’t believe he actually read it, Alex!”

“He did more than just read it,” Alex laughed, releasing Reggie from his arms. As he did, Luke’s singing and strumming stopped. The song was over. When Reggie didn’t move, Alex nudged him. 

“Well? Aren’t you going to go in and talk to Luke?”

At the suggestion, Reggie’s glowing happiness faded a little bit into nervousness. “Oh, well, I don’t know. I mean-”

“Reg,” Alex started, grabbing Reggie by the shoulders so they were eye-to-eye. “That song was awesome, okay? And clearly Luke was feeling it. You were so excited a second ago- just go talk to him.”

“Yeah, but-”

“The song is about Luke?” Alex gently finished for him when Reggie cut himself off and looked to the ground. Reggie nodded, and Alex let out a small sigh. “That’s  _ okay,  _ Reggie. I mean, I think we’ve all written a song about Luke at some point.”

Alex succeeded in getting Reggie to laugh, and the bassist nodded his head in acceptance of that fact. Alex smiled at him, squeezing his shoulders. “Just to talk to him, man.”

Reggie took a deep breath, then a single nod. He started to move away from Alex, only to immediately look back at the drummer. 

“Will you come with me?” Reggie asked nervously. 

Alex hesitated. This was really a conversation for the two of them. It would probably just be more awkward if he was there. He took in Reggie’s nervous demeanor as he reached for the garage door’s handle, missing the bouncing off the walls happy he’d been just minutes earlier. 

“Yeah,” he said against his better judgement. “I’ll go in with you.”

Reggie smiled appreciatively, and together they pulled open the door. Luke looked as if he hadn’t moved a single muscle since he’d finished singing, just staring at the sheet music before him with a weird expression on his face. His hands were still against his guitar strings, and he was sitting on the stool near the piano. Alex cleared his throat to announce their presence, causing Luke’s head to snap up towards them. He jolted into gear suddenly, quickly standing off the stool and setting down his guitar. His movements were awkward, and as he moved, his eyes were almost completely trained on Reggie. 

It made Alex smirk a little bit, and he wished Julie were here to exchange an exasperated eye roll with over the pure ridiculousness of their friends. 

“H-hey, guys.” 

Alex nodded his head in greeting with a smile, and Reggie shyly waved. Alex flitted his eyes back and forth between them. The tension in the room could probably be cut with a knife, and it was driving Alex crazy already. 

“Okay,” he said, clapping his hands loudly once. “Not that this isn’t fun, but I’m gonna go. . . be somewhere that’s not here. Sorry, Reg.”

\----------

Both guitarists were left staring at the spot Alex had just been. Reggie had a betrayed look on his face, while Luke’s eyebrows furrowed together in a confused frown. 

“Um, oh. . . kay?” Luke let out. Reggie could see him look at him out of the corner of his eye, but he was still watching the spot Alex had disappeared from, like he could force the drummer to come back with his mind. After a few more awkward, silence filled moments, Reggie let out a sigh, looking at Luke. 

“Well, I was just, um-”

“We heard you,” Reggie interrupted abruptly. “Outside. We heard you playing.”

“Oh,” Luke nodded, looking shy. Luke never looked shy about music. “Yeah. You left it sticking out the top of my journal, so it caught my eye. Figured I’d give it a try.”

Reggie nodded, moving to stand on the other side of the piano. He leaned into it, crossing his arms over the top. “So what’d you think?”

At the question, Luke gave him a genuine, bright smile. He shifted over, picking up the sheet music Reggie had left him. 

“Dude, it’s  _ really _ great. I mean, the lyrics, the notes- it’s a killer ballad. I didn’t know you wrote like this, Reggie! It’s usually just horses or pick up trucks.”

Luke finished with a small laugh, but Reggie frowned. “You’ve read my other stuff?”

Luke looked up at him, confusion stretched across his features. “Of course I did.”

His tone was that of him stating the obvious, like it was something he felt everyone should already know.

Reggie knew he would be blushing if he could, and he let out a quiet “Oh”, a smile forming across his lips. He had mostly left all of those as a joke, knowing it made Alex laugh when Luke found them and that Luke would give him that lopsided grin and an affectionate eye roll. They were all filled with messages underneath the cheesy country lyrics, though. Hidden words about the band, their friendship, his family, Luke. . . This was the first one where he’s said the words outright. 

“I’m glad you liked it,” Reggie said shyly, hope welling in his chest as Luke smiled at him widely. 

“It’s  _ awesome _ , man. Whoever you wrote it for-”

“What?” Reggie let out involuntarily, making Luke stop. Whoever he wrote it for? That certainly wasn’t what he had been expecting Luke to say. Reggie felt tense and increasingly awkward. Could he have made himself more obvious? He thought- 

Reggie felt almost sick. 

Luke frowned. “I was just saying that whoever you wrote the song for must be a really lucky person.”

Could ghosts throw up? Was that possible? Reggie felt like he was about to find out. He pushed himself up off the piano. With a tight smile, he let out a sigh. 

“Right. Well. Okay, I’m just gonna- see what Alex is up to.”

He didn’t even spare Luke a glance as he rushed his way towards the door, getting ready to poof out as soon as he was out of the room. Just before he could though, he felt Luke’s hand wrap around his bicep. He reluctantly turned to the other, willing any tears that wanted to form to stop as he did. Luke looked confused, and a little upset, as he searched Reggie’s face with his eyes. 

“Hey, wait. What- what’s wrong? Did I say something? I-”

“The song for you, Luke,” Reggie blurted out before he could stop himself. 

Luke’s grip on his arm went slack, his mouth dropping open a little. Reggie shook his head, feeling like an idiot. Tears welled in his eyes and he looked as far away from Luke as he could while the other was still holding his arm. He never should have left that song in Luke’s journal. 

“For me?”

“Yeah,” Reggie choked out. “Yeah, for you. I thought- maybe. . . it doesn’t matter. It was stupid.”

Reggie felt a tear roll down his cheek, and tried his best to hide it from Luke. He couldn’t believe he had ever thought that maybe Luke felt the same, even a little. Reggie felt like he was choking on the air in the room. He began moving towards the door again, arm slipping from Luke’s grip, but he was stopped again as Luke seemed to catch on, holding him in place again, this time by gripping his hand. As if this wasn’t hurting enough, Reggie though, now he had to live with the feeling of Luke holding his hand. 

“Reggie, stop!” Luke exclaimed, trying to pull him back. 

“Luke, it’s fine, okay? You don’t feel the same, I get it. Let’s just forget all about it,  _ please?” _

Reggie didn’t turn to look, but Luke was shaking his head almost violently. “No. I don’t want to forget about it.”

Reggie took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. 

“Reggie, will you please look at me?”

Reggie hated that he couldn’t resist the plea in Luke’s voice. This boy could tell him to walk through fire and he probably would. He turned his head, meeting Luke’s eyes. Luke, who had tears of his own in his eyes and who looked. . . happy? 

“You wrote that song for me,” Luke said slowly. “And you. . . love me?”

Reggie wanted to run away, forget all about this conversation, and hid until the humiliation was bearable. 

Instead, he nodded. 

Reggie didn’t know what to think when a small smile formed on Luke’s face. 

“You love me?” Luke questioned again, sounding a little choked up on his own tears. Reggie nodded again, blinking back a few tears. Where the hell was Luke going with this? If he wanted to make him feel bad, there were less cruel ways than this. 

“I love you, too, Reggie,” Luke whispered, and Reggie didn’t even have enough time to be confused before Luke was surging forward, covering Reggie’s lips with his own. 

Reggie was so shocked he didn’t know what to do. Luke was  _ kissing  _ him. One second ago Luke was a few words away from breaking his heart and now he loved him and was  _ kissing him.  _ Reggie’s entire body felt frozen to the spot with shock. Before he had a proper chance to recover and react to the fact that Luke was  _ kissing him _ , the other was pulling away, an apologetic look in his eyes. 

“Crap, Reg, I’m sorry. I should’ve asked or something-”

Reggie fell into Luke, both hands holding the other’s face as he kissed him soundly. He felt Luke smile into the kiss a little bit, wrapping his arms around Reggie’s waist and pulling him against his chest. Reggie couldn’t believe this was even happening right now, but here was Luke, holding him tightly and pressing kiss after kiss of pure  _ love  _ to his mouth. Reggie felt like he could break down in tears all over again, for a very different reason. When they pulled apart- Reggie may have forgotten that he needed to  _ breathe _ \- he searched Luke’s smiling face. 

“You love me?” he repeated Luke’s earlier question. Luke laughed a little, nodding.

“Sorry I’m such an idiot,” he responded, running a hand through Reggie’s hair before cupping his cheek. “I’ve been in love with you since ‘93. I just figured I was hearing what I wanted to hear.”

At a loss for words, Reggie just moved himself forward, wrapping his arms around Luke’s shoulders in a hug and burying his face in Luke’s neck. He let out a mixture between a sob and a laugh, loving the feeling of Luke’s arms around him, holding on tightly. They just clung onto each other like that for longer than Reggie could have counted. 

When they let go, all Reggie could think to ask was “So you really liked the song?”

Luke’s eyes always twinkled when he laughed. 

“Yeah, Reg, I really liked the song,” his voice was gentle, and loving, and the best sound Reggie had ever heard. 

He felt his own smile, the one Alex had found him with earlier, coming back full force. He bounced on his heels a little bit, still held in Luke’s arms. 

“I love you,” Reggie said aloud, to Luke’s face, for the first time. Luke ducked forward, pressing a quick kiss to his lips. 

Reggie would never get tired of that feeling. 

“I love you, too.”

Luke reached up, wiping the remainder of Reggie’s tears off his cheeks. 

“Would you sing it for me,” Luke asked, looking almost shy. “I was just trying it out for the first time- I’d love to hear it the way it’s supposed to sound.”

Reggie almost wanted to duck away from the intensity of the look Luke was giving him. He’d never had anyone look at him that way before. Like he was all that mattered in the world. 

Reggie nodded in answer to Luke’s question, grabbing the other’s hand and pulling him back towards the piano. He picked up Luke’s abandoned guitar- Reggie knew that he was the only person Luke had ever allowed to touch his guitar without permission. Bobby had tried once, and it had  _ not  _ been pretty. The thought had always made him smile, but knowing that Luke  _ loved  _ him and he was the only person allowed to touch the guitar was something entirely new and special. 

As he situated himself on the stool Luke had been on earlier, he turned to the other, who had taken a seat on the couch without taking his eyes off Reggie for a second. 

“Hey,” he began, “If I write you more songs, does it mean we can finally do a country album?”

Luke’s laugh was Reggie’s favorite sound in the world. Reggie smiled widely at him from his position on the stool. Shaking his head fondly, Luke responded, “Sure, Reg. Maybe we can do a country album.”

Reggie pumped his fist in the air in joking victory, making Luke honest-to-god giggle. 

“Just sing me my song, cowboy,” Luke teased with an affectionate roll of his eyes. Reggie smiled and nodded.

“I love you,” he mouthed, beginning to strum out the song. 

**Author's Note:**

> Yes I understand that this is basically the same plot as Dream Box Shenanigans but I'm a sucker for people writing Luke songs I guess
> 
> Edit:   
> JEREMY ACTUALLY WROTE HOME IS WHERE MY HORSE IS AND I CRIED Y'ALL 
> 
> I LOVE HIM


End file.
